


There is a Season

by Miriam_Heddy



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-21
Updated: 2015-08-20
Packaged: 2018-04-16 08:51:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 6
Words: 896
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4619166
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Miriam_Heddy/pseuds/Miriam_Heddy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>How many different ways can Spike say, "No!" to Xander? A series of vignettes, long and short, in search of a, "Yes."</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Root

**Author's Note:**

> The world's a bubble; and the life of man less than a span.  
> In his conception wretched; from the womb so to the tomb:  
> Curst from the cradle, and brought up to years, with cares and fears.  
> Who then to frail mortality shall trust,  
> But limns the water, or but writes in dust.  
> ~Francis Bacon, The Life of Man
> 
> Death unites as well as separates; it silences all paltry feeling.  
> ~Honore De Balzac

"Turn me."  
  
"Into what?"  
  
Harris blinked. "Into a rutebaga. What the hell, Spike. Into a vampire."  
  
"No."  



	2. Beat

"Turn me."  
  
"Int--"  
  
"Nuh-uh. Into a vampire."  
  
Spike shook his head. "No. Can't. Sorry."  
  
"Spike--"  
  
"Going out for smokes." Spike slammed the front door shut behind him  
and then leaned against it, listening to Harris' heart beating  
steadily, if a bit fast.  
  
His own was dead.  
  
Halfway to the shop he remembered he'd quit smoking and turned back  
toward home.  



	3. Necessities

"Spike, I need you to--"  
  
"No."  
  
"You're against buying orange juice now?"  
  
"What?"  
  
"We need OJ," Harris said again. "Bet you thought I was going to ask--"  
  
"The kind with the pulp, yeah?"  
  
Harris sighed and rubbed his forehead with the heel of his hand as if  
he had a headache. "Yeah. The kind with the pulp."  
  
"Got it. Anything else?" Spike looked at Harris and dared him to say it.  
  
Harris didn't, though he might as well have.


	4. Grey

"I'm going grey," Harris  
said, drawing a comb through his hair. Harris was thirty-three--still  
young--though the argument was old and Spike was tired of it.  
   
There were just a few grey hairs in the mix--hardly enough to notice  
much less worry about, though he played along.  
  
"Looks distinguished, love."  
  
Spike knew from the slight upturn of Harris' lips that he'd said the  
right thing.  
  
That happened, occasionally, though not often enough that he made a  
habit of it.


	5. Immunity

"Oi, Harris. Going to lie in bed all night?"  
  
"The night is young. The human is old and sick and possibly dying."  
  
"The human is lazy and thirty-five and has the common cold."  
  
"Hey, watch who you're calling common." Harris sneezed.  
  
Spike handed him the box of tissues and put a hand on Harris' forehead. He was warm--warmer than usual.  
  
"Hey--where are you--"  
  
Spike returned with the thermometer and put it into Harris' mouth. When it beeped, he pulled it out to look.  
  
Just as he thought.  
  
"Fever?" Harris asked, and sneezed again.  
  
"Just a bit," Spike said, wiping the spray of Harris' bodily fluids from his hands onto his jeans. Messy bugger. "Should take something for it before your brain cooks, though I don't suppose we'd notice either way."  
  
Harris nodded, looking vaguely at him with slightly glassy eyes, suggesting they might be a bit late to salvage Harris' Abby Normal. He was fairly sure Harris had just sneezed some of it out regardless. Harris' nose twitched and Spike left hastily, hearing the loud "Aaah Choo!" from the safety of the loo. He shut the medicine cabinet door and stared into the blank mirror, steeling himself to return to Harris' sickroom. He couldn't catch a cold, and he'd spent decades elbow-deep in demon entrails, but humans were disgusting when they were sick, and Harris was no different.  
  
After a moment and yet another sneeze, he returned to Harris with some paracetemol and a glass of water.  
  
Harris swallowed the pills and then some water, wincing as he did. "Thanks."  
  
"Throat sore?"  
  
Xander nodded and took another sip of water before setting the glass down on the bedside table.  
  
Spike sat on the edge of the bed, just out of range of Harris should he sneeze again.  
  
Harris cleared his throat. "I thought you were going to paint the town red? I mean, figuratively, not in the bloody sense. Or the paintbrush-in-hand redecorating sense."  
  
"Fever's making your head all fuzzy," Spike suggested, feeling generous.  
  
"Yeah, that must be it," Harris agreed and shivered, pulling the blanket up higher. "So you're staying in?"  
  
Spike nodded and picked up the remote, changing the channel to something that did not feature transporters. After a moment, he got up again, bringing back a DVD. He put it into the player.  
  
"Good choice," Harris observed, as the opening credits to  _Alien_  came on. "Y'know, I think I was three when this came out."  
  
Spike took his boots off and stripped off his jeans as well and got into bed, edging close enough to feel Harris' radiant heat--too warm but not dangerously so. As he lifted the coverlet, a large collection of sodden tissues rolled off the bed.  
  
Harris put his arm across Spike's middle and sniffled and then sneezed again, though this time, he managed to turn his head away and spared Spike being sprayed with it again. Harris could be surprisingly considerate sometimes.  
  
Before the baby could burst out of Kane's chest, Harris was snoring and sleeping fitfully at his side. Spike put his hand on Harris' forehead and watched the film and tried not to notice the slight wheeze of Harris' breathing as he waited for the fever to break.


	6. Second Sight

Harris rolled his eye. The other eye remained immobile, though the lid fluttered a bit over it. Spike found he was used to the difference between them, though he did notice when others noticed. He didn't miss the patch one bit.  
  
Harris noticed him looking and said, "Hey, maybe in another hundred years, they'll have figured out how to replace eyeballs."  
  
"Maybe they will," he agreed. "Read where they're developing a bionic eye."  
  
"Bet by the time that comes out, I'll be dead," Harris observed, his lower lip jutting out in an undignified pout.  
  
"Best hope the white coats get on it, then," Spike suggested, keeping his voice even and steady.  
  
Harris walked away, though he didn't go far.

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [fall_for_sx](http://fall-for-sx.livejournal.com).


End file.
